An antenna rotator (or antenna rotor) is a device used to change the orientation, within the horizontal plane, of a directional antenna. Most antenna rotators have two parts, the rotator unit and the controller. The controller is normally placed near the equipment which the antenna is connected to, while the rotator is mounted on the antenna mast directly below the antenna. Rotators are commonly used in amateur radio and military communications installations. They are also used with TV and FM antennas, where stations are available from multiple directions, as the cost of a rotator is often significantly less than that of installing a second antenna to receive stations from multiple directions. Rotators are manufactured for different sizes of antennas and installations. For example, a consumer TV antenna rotator has enough

torque In physics and mechanics, torque is the rotational equivalent of linear force. It is also referred to as the moment of force (also abbreviated to moment). It represents the capability of a force to produce change in the rotational motion of th ...

to turn a TV/FM or small

ham Ham is pork from a leg cut that has been preserved by wet or dry curing, with or without smoking."Bacon: Bacon and Ham Curing" in ''Chambers's Encyclopædia''. London: George Newnes, 1961, Vol. 2, p. 39. As a processed meat, the term "ham ...

antenna. These units typically cost around

US$ The United States dollar (symbol: $; code: USD; also abbreviated US$ or U.S. Dollar, to distinguish it from other dollar-denominated currencies; referred to as the dollar, U.S. dollar, American dollar, or colloquially buck) is the official ...

70 . Heavy-duty ham rotators are designed to turn extremely large, heavy, high frequency ( shortwave) beam antennas, and cost hundreds or possibly thousands of dollars. In the center of the reference picture, the accompanying image includes an AzEl installation rotator, so named for its controlling of both the

azimuth An azimuth (; from ar, اَلسُّمُوت, as-sumūt, the directions) is an angular measurement in a spherical coordinate system. More specifically, it is the horizontal angle from a cardinal direction, most commonly north. Mathematical ...

and the

elevation The elevation of a geographic location is its height above or below a fixed reference point, most commonly a reference geoid, a mathematical model of the Earth's sea level as an equipotential gravitational surface (see Geodetic datum § Ver ...

components of the direction of an antenna system or array. Such antenna configurations are used in, for example, amateur-radio satellite or EME (communications), moon-bounce communications. SatNOGS_v2_in_FOSDEM_2015

An open hardware AzEl rotator system is provided by the SatNOGS Groundstation project.

Manufacturers of consumer TV antenna rotators

Past

Before the era of cable TV and the rise of

satellite TV Satellite television is a service that delivers television programming to viewers by relaying it from a communications satellite orbiting the Earth directly to the viewer's location. The signals are received via an outdoor parabolic antenna commo ...

, many homes had outdoor antennas designed to capture over-the-air television signals. The rotator market was served by a number of manufacturers including * The Alliance Manufacturing Co., Inc., Alliance, Ohio *

Radio Shack RadioShack, formerly RadioShack Corporation, is an American retailer founded in 1921. At its peak in 1999, RadioShack operated over 8,000 worldwide stores named RadioShack or Tandy Electronics in the United States, Mexico, United Kingdom, Austra ...

* Channel Master * The Radiart Corp., Cleveland, Ohio * Cornell-Dubilier Corporation,

South Plainfield, New Jersey South Plainfield is a borough in Middlesex County, New Jersey, United States. It is located in the heart of the Raritan Valley region. As of the 2010 United States Census, the borough's population was 23,385,RCA The RCA Corporation was a major American electronics company, which was founded as the Radio Corporation of America in 1919. It was initially a patent trust owned by General Electric (GE), Westinghouse, AT&T Corporation and United Fruit Comp ...

* Sears, Roebuck and Co. * American Phenolic Corporation * Leader Electronics, Inc., Cleveland, Ohio * Gemini Industries, Inc., Passaic, New Jersey *

Philco Philco (an acronym for Philadelphia Battery Company) is an American electronics industry, electronics manufacturer headquartered in Philadelphia. Philco was a pioneer in battery, radio, and television production. In 1961, the company was purchased ...

* Lance Industries, Sylmar, California *

Philips Koninklijke Philips N.V. (), commonly shortened to Philips, is a Dutch multinational conglomerate corporation that was founded in Eindhoven in 1891. Since 1997, it has been mostly headquartered in Amsterdam, though the Benelux headquarters i ...

* Pro Brand International, Inc. (Eagle Aspen brand) *

Zenith The zenith (, ) is an imaginary point directly "above" a particular location, on the celestial sphere. "Above" means in the vertical direction ( plumb line) opposite to the gravity direction at that location ( nadir). The zenith is the "high ...

* Alinco Electronics, Inc. * Radio Merchandise Sales, Inc. * Kenpro * Nippon Antenna *Stolle * Hy-Gain

Current

Although the

cord-cutting In broadcast television, cord-cutting refers to the pattern of viewers, referred to as cord-cutters, cancelling their subscriptions to multichannel television services available over cable or satellite, dropping pay television channels or reduc ...

movement has increased interest in receiving free over-the-air television signals, as of December 2021 consumer options are limited. * VOXX Accessories Corporation of

Carmel, Indiana Carmel is a suburban city in Indiana immediately north of Indianapolis. With a population of 100,777, the city spans across Clay Township in Hamilton County, Indiana, and is bordered by the White River to the east; the Hamilton-Boone county l ...

, a wholly-owned subsidiary of

VOXX International Voxx International is an American consumer electronics company founded as Audiovox Corporation in 1960, and renamed Voxx in 2012. It is headquartered in Orlando, Florida. The company specializes in four areas: OEM and after-market automotive ...

, using the RCA trademark, offers a remote-controlled antenna rotator, the model VH226E.
Channel Master's stock of model CM-9521HD is depleted
and it is unclear whether more units will be manufactured. Antennas {{Mast-stub